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Many B2C marketers have a difficult relationship with premium display advertising. Tracking ROI isn't a straightforward proposition, which makes justifying this expenditure challenging. The task is even more daunting for B2B marketers, who operate in a very different landscape with a longer, more multifaceted buy cycle. But you don't need to jettison the display-ad component of your marketing strategy — you just need to learn how to make display ads work for you.

Commit to the Long Haul

B2B marketing is a long-term commitment. Prospects can take months to nurture and convert, so don't think of display as a quick fix. Don't expect a single campaign to produce results. Instead, run a consistent program over the course of several months.

If you've ever gone from one website to another and saw an ad for a product you viewed earlier at an online store or website, then you've experienced retargeting. This process, in the simplest terms, uses digital marketing techniques to target website visitors who left a site before completing a conversion.

While it might seem that a failed conversion is a sign that a consumer will not convert, online research suggests that this isn't the case. According to CMO.com, only about 2 percent of visitors to any given commerce website make a purchase on their first visit, but many more will ultimately execute a related conversion through that online retailer or through one of its competitors.

Retargeting helps businesses stay visible to consumers and increases the chance of ultimately gaining their business. It's a simple marketing strategy that offers great returns when executed properly, and many businesses are investing in these campaigns.

Online ad purchases involving people are on the way out. In 2015, display advertising will be primarily managed through computer-driven sales.

The New York Post points to a recent report from eMarketer that forecasts 55 percent of all such sales will be done by computers by the end of the year, as technology takes up the tedious task of determining optimal ad rates and deciding when the price goes too high. That means fewer negotiations between live individuals will take place. Even better, these processes can take place faster, with programmatic buying happening in real-time and adjusting on a whim to changing marketplace conditions.

Display advertising alone is a $15 billion business, meaning that roughly $8 billion of those sales will be handled entirely by computers, according to the report. But even more transformative is the way that programmatic ad buying is expected to expand beyond online outlets.

Banner ad promotions are as old as the Internet, and there may be some who think the banner ad is dead. But according to Nielson's most recent Trust in Advertising report, consumer trust in banner ads has nearly doubled in the past six years. Flashing images, little creatures running back and forth across the screen and the dizzying arrays of vibrant colors have been replaced with polished, clear, engaging ads that eerily show products you just viewed on another site. So you feel compelled to click.

Or do you? According to ComScore, despite the trillions of banners ads shown across sites, three in 10 are never seen. The challenge with banner ads is overcoming banner blindness — we're so accustomed to seeing these ads, and have grown so wary of clicking and finding ourselves in a labyrinth of clicks just to get to the initial offer, that banner ads can sometimes go ignored. So what does your banner ad need to make sure it gets noticed?

When formulating your overall marketing strategy for 2015, it's important to develop an inclusive plan that includes multiple channels across both traditional media and the Web. Though new concepts like geo-fenced mobile ads, hypertargeted search and live video ad insertion will put you on the cutting edge of marketing, one of the most crucial components of your marketing strategy is one that's nearly as old as the Web itself: display advertising.

What Is Old Is New Again

Though the concept behind display ads may not have changed much in the past two decades, the technology that delivers this type of content to consumers has made leaps and bounds. No longer are marketers confined to graphics-based banner ads that consumer eyes simply gloss over. Today's display ad, ideally, is connected to content the reader cares about; is targeted to the consumer, using things like browsing history and location; and includes a strong call-to-action that doesn't just go for the click, but invites consumers to learn more about the product being advertised.

The ubiquity of banner ads may sound like a good thing at first, because you can find them just about anywhere on the Web. But their prevalence has actually been working against them in recent years. Because they're getting so used to seeing these ads, many consumers automatically scroll past banner ads without looking at them, according to research reported on by Adotas. How, then, can marketers use this medium to actually influence consumers and expand reach? These three banner ad best practices are a great place to start:

1. Simplicity Is Best

Though it's tempting to stuff your banner ad with graphics and eye-catching animations, consumers need to know what the ad is about in two to three seconds. Beyond that, their eyes dart away to the body of the page they're reading. Taking advantage of customers' extremely limited attention spans requires a simple, uncluttered design with only a few colors, a logo and perhaps a single graphic.

Behavioral targeting is a hot trend in digital marketing right now, and for good reason: data insights open up a whole new dimension for acquiring behavior-based insights. As opportunity-rich as it is, though, behavior isn't the only consideration that brands should be using to target consumers.

There are a multitude of ways to slice and dice a consumer base, and many are unique in how they single out consumers. Here are 10 winning methods for targeting your audience online:

1. Demographic

Demographic targeting is the most basic strategy for targeting. It shouldn't be used on its own because factors such as age and gender can be too broad. However, these facts are critical when targeting further within other, supplementary strategies.

2. Geographic

Geographic targeting has become much more valuable recently, thanks to mobile devices that make location information more accessible. If you're primarily concerned with consumers in a certain geographic area, this means of targeting ensures that you only spend ad dollars within that established region.

Retargeting became quite the buzzword in 2014. Marketing Land recently reported on an AdRoll survey that found that the percentage of marketers who spent over 50 percent of their digital advertising budget on retargeting doubled from 7 percent in 2013 to 14 percent in 2014. While 2014 saw interest in this marketing method ramp up, 2015 should see an even bigger surge as this marketing tool grows even more among businesses of all sizes. Though marketers may be hesitant to jump on this bandwagon, this is one trend that should not be missed.

Social Retargeting Boosts Impressions and Clicks by Huge Margins

Though there are plenty of different types of retargeting, social retargeting has been the most heartily embraced by marketers, with 54 percent of those surveyed saying that social retargeting was a better use of resources than mobile, search or even email retargeting. VentureBeat notes that AdRoll data backs this assertion up, showing that social retargeting drives nearly triple the impressions and clicks than other forms of retargeting. In addition, social retargeting also leads to more than double the conversions, making it not only a great tool for exposure, but a must for improving sales as well.

One of the benefits of marketing online is that it allows advertisers to speak to the highly specific market of their choosing. So if, for expample, you represent a fertility clinic, you probably wouldn't market to men or women over 60. Instead, you would employ a technique called hypertargeting to define your target audience. Using the example of a fertility clinic above, marketers may wonder whether they should target women who have "liked" parenting pages on Facebook, those who live in certain areas or even those who fall within a certain income bracket. Marketers should be careful, though, about excluding potential customers by narrowing specifications too far.

Since there is no one-size-fits-all method to hypertargeting, the following guidelines can help you figure out how to target an audience that is broad enough to include different types of people and isn't so specific that you miss out on potential consumers.

The holiday season is a critical time of year for most retailers. It offers massive revenue opportunities that, for some companies, can decide whether they end the year in the black or in the red.

At the same time, it's easier to miss opportunities during the holiday season than at any other time of year, because shoppers are less patient and more hurried.

If you're a retailer, you probably know that it takes hard work to reach these frazzled consumers. Mobile is a major asset in this sense. When used properly, a mobile shopping strategy can connect you to consumers you might have otherwise missed while driving an influx of shoppers into your physical stores. Here are some simple tips to leverage mobile for greater holiday sales.

Geotargeting Busy Shoppers

Shoppers are in a hurry, and they're bound to run into trouble. One store is out of a certain product, while others don't carry it. As shoppers search for options, they often use mobile phones. By using geotargeted ads, brands can focus on consumers in close proximity to a store, driving in shoppers simply by increasing awareness.